


Fate/Defied

by rvd1945



Category: Fate/Zero, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Enigmatic Saber, F/F, More characters to come, Pairings Decided but Pending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:02:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23958889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rvd1945/pseuds/rvd1945
Summary: It is the advent of the Fourth Holy Grail War, and something is amiss--rotten in the city of Fuyuki. The King of Knights is not who everyone thought she was. This change fundamentally shifts the balance of the ritual; to what end, only Zelretch could possibly say, and he isn't telling. Kiritsugu scrambles to regain control over the situation. Tokiomi faces a reckoning. With their worlds coming crumbling down around their ears, Kayneth, Tokiomi and the Kotomines, and Kiritsugu are equally at a loss as to how to put the situation to rights. As for Saber, not even those who ought to be closest to her can discern her motives, let alone her agenda. Because she has one, a wish that burns fervently in her cold, black heart--and it is most decidedly NOT to remove herself from history so that another might rule. Casting aside her pride, her honour, and purging away everything extraneous save for the victory she can grasp with her own two hands, Saber reaches for the future, to change the inevitable--to defy fate itself.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	Fate/Defied

The point at which Emiya Kiritsugu should have begun having doubts as to how this ritual was going to go came relatively early. It came with a black-bladed sword being held to his throat, just below the chin, the razor-sharp point tilting his head up-and-down, side-to-side. The blade that was even now threatening his life was not at all what he had expected out of the holiest of holy swords, Excalibur. Its surface was cut from the cloth of night, and inlaid into it were patterns of scarlet, sanguine and infernal. 

The woman who was holding it was hardly what he expected, either. First off,  _ she was a woman.  _ Besides that revelation, her armour was heavy, wrought of black metal and pulsing with fiery veins, and viciously spiked in several places. Her skirt--well, more of a coat, really--extended to her mid-calves, and her thighs were externally plated in cruel black plate. Her hair was a pale, pale blonde, her skin ashen, but her eyes were a bloody scarlet that seemed to sear his soul.

“Artoria Pendragon, I presume?”

“Arta,” she corrected sharply, and while her voice had a musical quality, it was harsh and dissonant, far more accustomed to barking orders than to singing. “Arta  _ the _ Pendragon. It’s not a patronymic, it’s a title. It would be equivalent to the modern English ‘king.’ But yes, I am she.”

Kiritsugu rolled his eyes, and soon regretted it; the point dug into his throat, drawing a thin streamer of blood. 

“I am summoned at the behest of the Holy Grail to do battle in this benighted time. Contrary, however, to the term you would give me-- _ Servant _ \--I expect to be an equal partner in this enterprise. I have known one ‘master’ already--never again.”

“There are no records of you being summoned in a previous Holy Grail War!” exclaimed Irisviel, his wife.

Artor-- _ Arta _ \--looked away from him and towards her. “A homunculus? What  _ interesting  _ company you keep, messer. No, homunculus, I have not yet participated in this ritual. The Holy Grail  _ I  _ know of is a goblet carved of one of the boughs of the World Tree, said to have held the blood of the Christian saviour, he whom the Romans call Iesus Cristi. But no, the master of whom I speak…a vile woman was she. And thus did I swear never to bend my knee to another again.”

Her head turned again to him. “ _ Are we clear? _ ”

“Crystal,” replied Kiritsugu.

“Good. Now, that does not mean I will not follow orders or cooperate with you. A war fought by committee is one already lost, after all. My sword is yours as it would be any ally’s. But we are  _ allies.  _ A dragon is not a slave,” Arta pronounced. “Now, I believe you have me at a disadvantage, Ally. What is thy name?”

“My name is Emiya Kiritsugu.”

“A man of the Orient? I must confess that my knowledge of the East ends at Hindustan. Very well, however. My pride does not forbid me from acknowledging when another’s knowledge surpasses my own.”

“The Grail does not provide you with information?” asked Iri.

“Knowledge without context is mere distraction,” replied Arta, lowering her blade at last. “You of all people should know that,  _ homunculus. _ ”

“My name is Irisviel! Irisviel von Einzbern!” cried Iri.

“Von Einzbern? A Saxon, then? Well met,” said Arta, stepping forward. Irisviel shrank back--Arta exuded an aura of menace and darkness that sucked the light and courage from the room. “No need to recoil, my lady. I mean you no harm. My mother, Igraine, was from your land. Ser Ector and Ser Kay, my foster father and brother respectively, were likewise Saxons; as such, I believe we have fundamentally more in common than we do differences.”

_ Well, would you look at that--the King of the Britons, claiming Saxon heritage… _ Kiritsugu mused.  _ Yet another thing I didn’t foresee… _

“Very well, then. Onto another topic. Emiya Kiritsugu. What is thy wish for the Grail?”

That question, point-blank, shocked Kiritsugu.

“And do not lie. Allies do not deceive one another. Should you attempt it, I shall know you for a foe and dispatch you accordingly,” said the famed and illustrious King of Knights, levelling her burning scarlet gaze upon him.

“My wish for the Grail… The world is a cruel place, and cruel people make it so. I would make it a world where no one would cry…”

Arta frowned. “Hmph. I should hope you rid yourself of such fool sophistry ere the war ends, and you are faced with a choice you did not intend to have to make, Emiya Kiritsugu.”

-

Irisviel von Einzbern had many expectations when Kiritsugu told her that they were summoning the King of Knights. Arta the Pendragon, as she demanded to be called, or merely Arta when the need was pressing, seemed to be determined to flout all of them. She was a study in contradictions, and no sooner had Irisviel come to believe she had nailed down one aspect of her personality than did another come along to blast that supposition out of the water. She was a knight; yet, she seemed to believe in no code of chivalry, merely a strong, nigh-unshakable belief in the magnitude of her own power that almost bordered on arrogance. She was a woman who masqueraded as a man; yet, she held the trappings of masculinity in the highest contempt. She was graceful despite her choice of attire; yet, she devoured whatever food was on hand with an almost monomaniacal focus on getting it into her stomach, with no head for propriety or manners when there was sustenance to be had.

It was why she was still uncomfortable with the woman even while travelling to Fuyuki City, Japan, ground zero of the Fourth Holy Grail War, separate from Kiritsugu aboard an aeroplane. The Saber-class Servant, though she did not care to hide her name, believing her strange affinity for darkness and shadow to be cover enough, was completely at ease as she settled into her seat aboard the plane and closed her eyes to conserve mana, dressed, as she was, in an outfit that was best described as ‘goth-lolita fashion.’ She wore an elegant, yet frilled black dress, blacker than pitch, having more in common with the night sky, complete with a corset to flatter her slim waist, a pair of sheer black stockings, and black combat boots to complete the ensemble. She kept her long, pale blonde hair tied back with a ribbon, having explained that while she used to wear her hair in a bun, she now preferred to have it in a high ponytail; yet despite this, while eclectic, largely inoffensive choice in attire, she at all times radiated an aura of killing intent that choked the air around her and put the instincts of everyone on the plane on edge.

Arta seemed to take to modern culture like a fish to water, using the allowance Kiritsugu was allowed to give her on music and reading material. On the way to the airport, she had been busy scoffing at and defacing a copy of the  _ Prose Edda,  _ declaiming it as ‘Christian claptrap.’ She had a Walkman now, and within it turned a CD by an American guitarist named Jimi Hendrix.

That wasn’t all she did, though. She dedicated hours of her day to consistent practise, even going so far as to purchase a text, meticulously searched for, called “How A Man Shall Be Armed for His Ease When He Shall Fight on Foot.” Besides this, she had books in German titled such things as “Gründtliche Beschreibung der Kunst des Fechtens,” and “Der Zettel.” They were lovingly earmarked and noted in many places throughout their bindings, almost as though she was taking great care to study them. What the King of Knights could stand to learn from fourteenth to sixteenth century swordsmanship manuals was beyond Irisviel, but then again, as she didn’t practise swordplay, she supposed that she should really defer to the resident expert in the Emiya household. 

“What’s bothering you, Irisviel?”

Arta’s voice shocked Irisviel out of the depths of her thoughts, and she turned to the woman with wide eyes. The strange Servant’s unnerving scarlet gaze studied her, but her expression was largely quizzical in spite of that. Her headphones were now around her neck, and the harsh sound of guitar riffs blared out of them, tinny from a distance but doubtlessly riveting up close. 

“O-oh, nothing, nothing at all!” cried Irisviel, not wishing to offend.

“If it truly was nothing, you wouldn’t be reacting the way you are,” said Arta, blunt as always. “Tell me.”

Irisviel sighed. “It’s just…what do you hope to gain from these materials that the Grail cannot give?”

Arta smirked, and it was not a kind smirk. Her face was austere as ever, and in its severity, the smirk seemed out of place, perhaps even a touch sinister. “Ah. Well, unlike  _ certain  _ Heroic Spirits, my resources do not increase as time passes. Nor am I marked by the passage of time. At the end of my life, I made a contract with…an entity. I suppose you may call it the Grail if you so choose. In exchange for a single wish, I would bind my fate to it, for all time.

“This contract did not allow me to pass into the Throne of Heroes. I was a… I suppose the closest term you would understand would be ‘Counter Guardian,’ though that’s about as accurate as calling mittens ‘firearms.’ I stayed on Camlann, the hill where I was fated to die, until it came time to answer the Grail’s summons as a Heroic Spirit. I am still-- _ mostly _ \--as human as ever I was, which is why I cannot phase into Spirit Form. I once supposed that I could only be summoned as a Saber-class Servant, but a relatively recent turn of events took my so-called certainty on the subject and tore it to shreds. I may apparently be summoned as a Lancer, Rider, Berserker, or Caster, or so I have since learned.

“Anyway, because I am still, in essence, flesh and blood, the Grail cannot build me as a copy of the master mould that exists in the Throne of Heroes. This is true summoning. Therefore, the Grail must upload its information directly into my living brain, and that is an imperfect process at the best of times.

“What do I think to gain with these materials, Irisviel?  _ Context. _ A frame of reference in which to place this modern era,” she finished at last with a sharp nod.

That made enough sense. Only one question remained in Irisviel’s mind. She voiced it.

“Um… What does ‘upload’ mean?”

Arta’s face shut down entirely, blankness being the only conveyed impression emanating from her expression. “It’s a long story. Don’t ask.”

Irisviel had a niggling suspicion that she was on the cusp of something incredibly important, but as she detested interpersonal conflict, she shrugged her shoulders and made a note to mention the incident to Kiritsugu.  _ He  _ would know what to do.

He always did.

-

The pair landed in the Fuyuki airport right on schedule, and Kiritsugu would usually have handled the things he had left to do on his own and sent his partner, Maiya, to the airport to pick them up; however, with how utterly unpredictable and prickly the King of Knights had turned out to be, Kiritsugu thought it best to show up to pick up his wife and his S… _ ally.  _ Having sent Maiya to complete his remaining busywork, he leaned up against the magnificent car the Einzbern family had provided him with, and finished smoking his cigarette to calm his nerves.

“Emiya Kiritsugu. I had thought you would find a lackey to escort us.”

Kiritsugu threw his cigarette to the ground and stomped it out with his shoe. He chuckled. “And what would give you that idea, Arta?”

“Simply that it is your modus operandi,” said Arta, her face concealing not a lick of guile, but still utterly inscrutable in its remarkable austerity as she tilted her head, her scarlet eyes wide like a doe’s. “Or am I incorrect?”

“You are correct; however, with your combat abilities unknown to me, it seemed prudent to nip a potential security risk in the bud,” said Kiritsugu as he motioned to the automobile.

“Heh. Very well. Then perhaps it is best that we find a way for me to… _ demonstrate  _ the strength of thy ally,  _ Emiya. _ ”

Kiritsugu did not like the way she said his family name. It sounded far too much like how mages at the Clocktower said his moniker-- _ Magus Killer. _ He shrugged it off and got into the driver’s seat, while Arta got into the back seat without complaint, leaving the passenger seat to Iri. Immediately Arta yawned and closed her eyes, laying back against the sumptuous leather of the back row of seats, turning up the volume on her Walkman to where it blared, and the aggression of Jimi Hendrix’s guitar provided a backdrop to Kiritsugu’s and Irisviel’s eventual conversation. 

He kept away from talk of strategy--the King of Knights had made it  _ excruciatingly _ clear that that was to be between the two of them, nominal Master and nominal Servant. It irked him how she alternatively treated Irisviel as a friend and as a pawn, and something itched at the back of his mind, some idea that Arta knew things she  _ definitely  _ should not have, things that perhaps were mysteries even to  _ him. _ Instead, he spoke to his wife of smaller things, like their daughter Ilyasviel, or Jubstacheit’s many veiled threats and warnings, given immediately before their departure. She was comfortable with filling the silence of the car, and Kiritsugu was intent to listen, nodding his head or grunting in either affirmation or rejection when appropriate.

It made his train of thought cease completely when Irisviel mentioned the word that Arta had used as though it were not some obscure technical term, but common parlance. He had heard the word ‘upload’ before. He knew, roughly, what it meant, enough to guess at Arta’s meaning in using it. But her usage of the word, with seemingly perfect understanding of what it meant, ran directly counter to what she had told them of the Grail’s imperfect imparting of knowledge onto her. Deciding it to be but a single piece of evidence that was in no way indicative of a larger plot or image of the world that was meant to be unknown to him, he did not address it, but filed it away in the recesses of his mind.

When they arrived at the hotel that would be their temporary base of operations, Arta’s eyes immediately snapped open. Opening the car door with her foot, she kicked it open with a decidedly human level of strength, and stepped out of the vehicle, onto the pavement. She looked around with none of the wonder that Kiritsugu might have expected; in a vacuum, such a difference between preconception and reality would not have meant much, if anything. But when he had reason to believe that their Servant was not being entirely truthful, or at the very least forthcoming, with them, he made sure to note that down as well. He sighed. The King of Knights should have been simple, straightforward--the least of his worries. Instead, what he got was an endless litany of questions, this incident being only the most recent of examples of bizarre behaviour on the part of the Once and Future King.

“Is everything to your liking?” asked Irisviel, ever more conscientious than he.

“Mm,” she grunted, nodding, her scarlet eyes scanning around and doing their best to locate exits and potential security breaches. “We would be better served moving on to a more secure location, Kiritsugu. This building is far too exposed for my liking, not to mention it’s full of holes. No amount of warding the building, after all, would be able to prevent a detonation in the lower levels.”

Kiritsugu froze, but just for a moment. The pronouncement that Arta had just made was eerie in how much it resembled his own M.O., for which he was utterly infamous amongst certain circles of magi. He recovered quickly, but not quickly enough; his ally’s eyes were upon him, studying every quirk of his reaction, before she nodded to herself and smiled grimly as she turned away. 

“The docks ought to be our first port of call. We aren’t going to be able to eliminate all the Masters and Servants in one go, but if we manage to draw even  _ one  _ Master-Servant pair out of their hidden atelier, then I believe the night would be a success; our odds of success would accordingly uptick from fourteen to seventeen percent. That three percent difference might not seem like much, but it will doubtless snowball quickly,” said Arta.

“I agree,” said Kiritsugu. “You and Iri…”

“No, Kiritsugu,” replied Arta, stalking up to him, levelling a finger at his chest, and poking him mercilessly. “This is  _ your  _ wish. I would have you bear witness to the blood that shall be spilt in  _ your  _ name, on  _ your  _ account. And for that, I would have it no other way than to have you support me in battle, and for Irisviel, being the battery from which I draw my mana, to remain safe and guarded. The Holy Grail War is perhaps more dangerous than you realise--not simply in combat, but in the metaphysics of dealing with that which is  _ utterly  _ beyond your ken.”

Kiritsugu put his hands up, cursing himself. He really  _ should  _ have expected this level of vehemence from his ally, but then again, there was no way he could have predicted what would happen up until now, so perhaps he was giving himself too much credit. Still… “There are actually  _ six  _ active Servants at the moment.”

“Oh-ho-ho! And you’re  _ certain  _ of this?” ridiculed Arta. “Which one? Let me guess.  _ Assassin? _ ”

“Yes,” said Kiritsugu, puzzled.

“Intelligence you have not gathered on your own is _worthless,_ ” said Arta, poking him in the sternum once more. “And Assassins are by their nature the slipperiest of Servants. I believe it to be foolish to count them out _just yet._ I do not trust the death of any Servant not eliminated by my own hand. You must be more vigilant, o ally, my ally, if you _truly_ wish to emerge from this victorious.” 

Kiritsugu at this point was more than a little irritated, but Arta was, unfortunately, correct. His instincts screamed at him that there was something going on beneath the table, so to speak, and if  _ his _ instincts told him that, he knew that Arta’s would likely tell the same tale. “Very well. We’ll do it your way.”

“Good. And worry not. I have no compunctions with however it is you do things,  _ to a point.  _ Do not cross that line, Kiritsugu, and we shall have no issues.” Having issued her final threat/warning, she turned around and walked briskly to the car, taking out her and Irisviel’s luggage before taking the bags into the hotel.

“You need the keycard to get into the room!” called Kiritsugu.

Arta waved her hand, and in between her fingers was a laminated slip of plastic that looked suspiciously like the keycard to a high class hotel room--the kind that Arta was entering right then. Kiritsugu patted himself down, and when he found it, he took out the stiffly-folded paper within which  _ should  _ have been the keycard.

It was gone.

“When…?! How…?!”

“She’s certainly a handful, isn’t she?” remarked Irisviel.

Kiritsugu buried his tired, worn face in between his calloused hands. “You have  _ no  _ idea how true that statement is…”

-

When Lancer’s challenge went off, Arta was already in place. She was standing, balanced perfectly atop a skyscraper’s highest point, when Diarmuid Ua Duibhne, First of the Knights of the Fianna, advertised his presence, setting off the magical equivalent of a flare visible in all directions across the entirety of Fuyuki City. But she could not reveal that she knew his class, let alone who he was, and so when she informed Kiritsugu, breaking him apart from the illicit kiss he shared with Maiya, something she herself disapproved of but didn’t have a leg to stand on concerning given her history with marriage bonds and infidelity, she merely sent,  _ Enemy Servant, near to the docks.  _ **_Don’t_ ** _ kill the Master. You never know when having a defeated Master in your debt might come in handy. _

She had no attachment to Sola-Ui Nuada-Ne Sophia-Ri, and even less to Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald. Someone who would betray the sacred bond of trust between Master and Servant, between Lord and Knight, was not someone she would ordinarily be able to countenance the continued existence of, and despite her having thrown her ideals to the wayside long ago, some of this prejudice against the magus persisted. It didn’t help that bastards like Tohsaka Tokiomi considered him a ‘proper’ magus, either.  _ Still, I  _ **_do_ ** _ owe him to at least preserve the life of his lord, just as I owe him to dispatch him before he can once more know the sting of betrayal…  _

These thoughts in mind, she sighed, smiled slightly, and shook her head. To the sky, she remarked, “It seems I’m still the same sap I was all those years ago. I wonder what you would say were you here…my love…”

Her face slipped back into its hardened cast. To Kiritsugu once more, ignoring his irritation at having his privacy invaded, she sent,  _ I’m moving to engage. Have Irisviel well-rested and continually stocked on mana. I don’t intend to lose this war simply because a shoddy construct meant to continuously generate enormous quantities of mana could not handle the amount I demand of her. _

_ …Roger…  _ Kiritsugu sent back.

“All tasks at hand have been cleared, then. Await me, my love.” With that, Arta let the mana flow through her body, so clean and so pure that she almost felt bad about tainting it with her inner darkness. A surge of red-and-violet-black energy exploded into existence around her, and when it dissipated, it left her fully clad in her armour. Holding out her hand, she materialized the corrupted Excalibur in her hand. Being ambidextrous, after all, did not mean that one could not have their preferences; hers were to fight primarily with the right hand, and writing primarily with her left, as a  goði might. She peered at the blade. Excalibur Morgan, after her sister by her Saxon mother, Igraine. It fit in her hand better and brought her far less guilt and shame than it had when it was blessed by her former master, the treacherous bitch. She lowered her blinder over her eyes, and for the first time in years beyond counting, entered battle.

-

Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald was content to stay hidden as Lancer called out the other Heroic Spirits, to dispatch them one by one. He was content to command his Servant in battle, and knew better than to risk himself. True, Lancer was not his first choice of Servant, but his legend was well-known in certain circles, he handled himself well in combat, and had impeccable comportment for a hero of his age and homeland.

No sooner had Lancer broadcasted his presence than did a meteor swirling with energies darker and more fell than any Kayneth had ever encountered in his many decades studying, researching, and mastering magecraft at the Clocktower, crash down directly into Lancer. His Servant barely had the time to guard before the meteor was upon him, sending him flying back fifty metres into a warehouse, where he landed in a heap.

When he took a closer look, however, the meteor seemed to resolve itself into a small woman, no more than one-hundred sixty centimetres in height, but clad in heavy plate armour, sable and cruel, and wielding a sword in the approximate shape of the greatest of holy swords, but exuding an energy so filled with menace that it stole his breath from his lungs and pained his magesight to look upon. He couldn’t analyse it, not with any spell in his arsenal, nor with any natural abilities he possessed. The object itself was a curse--no,  _ worse  _ than a curse, though he knew not what to call it.

Lancer sprung forth from the wreckage his impromptu landing had caused, pulling himself out of the crater his body had rent in the concrete. “Berserker?!”

“No…” said Kayneth, turning his gaze to the Servant. She herself was blackened, not by curses, but by something far darker, something for which the very concept of “pure evil” was but a descriptor and not a definition. Her stats, however, appeared before him before long. “Strength: A. Endurance: A. Agility: A. Mana:  _ A++! _ Luck: C. Noble Phantasm…  _ EX?!  _ And no madness enhancement anywhere to be found… She’s a Saber!”

Lancer’s eyes went progressively wider as every parameter was relayed to him. “A Saber?! Impossible!”

“Lancer, get out of there!”

“No, my lord. A knight does not retreat, not even in the face of insurmountable odds! I will strike her down, no matter  _ how  _ powerful she is!”

Kayneth quivered with rage and terror. “I…  _ Fine.  _ Make use of your Noble Phantasm, if you must.”

“Thank you, my lord,” said Lancer. His spears’ wrappings peeled away to reveal a long spear that was a bloody red slash in the darkness, and a bumblebee-yellow short spear--the Gáe Dearg and the Gáe Buidhe. 

The Saber-class Servant did not even blink.

“You value your pride before your life. A good sentiment,” remarked the Saber.

With a battle-cry, Lancer charged at her full-tilt, the Gáe Dearg to tear apart her armour and the Gáe Buidhe to inflict a wound that not even the Battle Continuation skill could allow her to survive. She dodged backwards, back, back, and Lancer seemed to have her on the defensive. Retreating and dodging, Lancer seemed to have the Saber on the proverbial ropes. Seeing an opening, he prepared to go in for the kill.

Then Kayneth saw something that made his skin go ashen. 

“Lancer! Behind you!”

Lancer didn’t have the chance to even turn his head before the cursed black blade erupted from the front of his chest, Saber putting her full weight behind the blow and following through on her charge. Lancer gasped and coughed up quite a bit of blood. “But…how?! Was… Was I chasing an afterimage the entire time?!”

“Pride Before Life. Honour Before Pleasure. Duty Before Love. A knight’s code. A good sentiment, but woefully naive. And now you have paid the price,” intoned Saber, placing a greave upon his back and pulling her blade slowly out of his heart. “But because I owe you a debt, Ser Diarmuid, I shall allow you a single piece of solace: thy lord shall survive thee.”

“You have…my thanks… But… Why…do you tell me this?” asked Diarmuid, perplexed.

“Because once upon a time, in a world that is no longer and shall never again be, you suffered a grave betrayal, a violation of thy honour as a knight. I do this now, in hopes that the Æsir shall look upon my deed and deem my debt paid. As you pass beyond this world and into the halls of Asgard, know, Diarmuid, that so long as I live, I shall never allow thy pride to pass into the void.”

“Thank you…Saber…”

Diarmuid dropped off of the end of the blade darker and more vile than the most hideous of curses, and exploded into a shower of azure sparks before his body even hit the ground.

“No, thank you, old friend. May my deeds do honour to thy memory.”

Saber then turned her blinded eyes up to Kayneth, and, smirking, said, “You had best fly. I doubt Rider or Archer will look as kindly upon your continued existence as I.”

No sooner had she said this then did lightning come crashing across the skies, and a flying cart pulled by a pair of magnificent oxen streak through the heavens to alight upon the earth.

-

Waver Velvet had no idea why his Servant, the King of Conquerors, Iskandar, flew so quickly into battle when Lancer was destroyed by that monster of a Heroic Spirit. All he knew was that he had no choice but to be dragged along for the ride. He thought he caught a glimpse of his old teacher, Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald, vacating the premises, but he passed it off as a delusion of terror as Alexander the Great barrelled onto the battlefield, his Master in tow.

Saber--for, despite all outward appearances, she possessed not a single degree of madness enhancement, which was required for her to be a Berserker--looked up expectantly, the point of her black sword digging into the cement as she rested both hands upon its hilt, standing tall and regal even as the other king came into view.

“Rider. You’re late.”

“Hmm? Were we expected, boy?”

“You need not ask your Master; your coming was…foretold, I suppose one might say,” replied Saber. She inclined her head. “My name is Arta. I am…I  _ was… _ the Pendragon of Prydain, which in modern parlance is Britain.”

“The King of Knights?!” exclaimed Waver.

The legendary king inclined her head towards the apprentice magus. “Some have called me that in the past, aye.”

“Very good!” interrupted Iskandar, and though he seemed boisterous, Waver could sense his Servant’s hesitation, his caution, and his creeping realization that something was definitely amiss. “I am the King--”

“--of Conquerors, Iskandar, better known as Alexander the Great,” finished Saber.

Iskandar leaned forward in his chariot. “Wow! Do you have some special skill that reveals Servants’ true names?!”

“Let’s just call it ‘women’s intuition’, and leave it at that, eh? Besides, we’re waiting on one more king.”

“Oh? Who do you mean?” asked Rider.

A cloud of golden dust coalesced above a nearby street lamp, and with a brilliant flash of light, there came into being a Heroic Spirit of such overwhelming charisma that Waver almost felt compelled to bow down before him. “Hmph. And I suppose you’re referring to  _ me,  _ mongrel?!”

The King of Knights smirked. “But of course. One cannot declare themselves to be a king without drawing the attention of the first to fail in the quest for immortality. How are snakes treating you these days, then, King of Heroes?”

“And just who gave you permission to ask questions of  _ me,  _ mongrel?!” asked the Servant, and from the name that the King of Knights gave him alone, Waver could immediately tell who this Heroic Spirit was. “ _ Me, the King?! _ ”

“Gilgamesh…” whispered Waver, before clapping his hands to his mouth to attempt to make certain he wasn’t heard.

To Waver’s eternal confusion, the King of Knights merely grinned. “Still as arrogant as ever, to sit up there in your heavenly throne, looking down on us ‘lesser beings…’ Ha ha ha… Truly, you are no better now than the very gods you forsook!” 

The King of Heroes trembled with rage. “No better than the gods, am I? Your insolence begs only for  _ death! _ And so, knave who has the gall to accept the title of king-- _ in my presence,  _ no less--it is death that I shall grant you!”

With that, the area directly behind Gilgamesh shimmered, and golden portals began to spread like the petals of a river-flower in the air. From each came a single weapon--a sword, a spear, an axe--and no two of these weapons were the same. Just looking at them caused Waver a headache, for each was a Noble Phantasm, and no matter the rank, a Noble Phantasm was still exactly that.

“This is bad,” said Rider. “There’s no way she can dodge all of those weapons with all that armour on.”

“Very well,” said Saber. “But this is not a battle between a king and his wayward subject. Contest it all you wish, but the moment you challenged me, this became a battle between kings. And as the King of Conquerors will tell you, no king stands alone! Lancelot!”

The moment she said that, Gilgamesh’s Noble Phantasm launched its projectiles. Waver, however, whipped his head around, and just in time to catch a black streak across the way. Clad from head to toe in black plate, both like and completely different from the King of Knights, the streak solidified as it slowed, and Waver was able to immediately tell that it was a Berserker. It exuded a black smoke that obscured anything else he was able to discern from it, but that dissipated half-way through the streaking attack, and the Berserker stopped just in front of Saber, tearing up the pavement as it arrested its own momentum. Such was the nature of Berserker’s armour, after all, that their sex was entirely obscured. Given how King Arthur was a woman, this armoured beast had an equal chance of being male or female, Waver reasoned.

The first two weapons shot at the King of Knights, and therefore Berserker, who was standing in between them, the unknown Servant caught, and then used to deflect the weapons that Gilgamesh continued to launch. Ten, twenty, thirty swords, spears, blunt weapons and axes littered the ground after but a few moments of Gilgamesh’s sustained onslaught.

“You  _ dare  _ interfere with the King’s Justice, mad dog?!” cried the King of Heroes, and where there were once two portals firing weapons as projectiles, now there were half a dozen, and the flow intensified threefold. It seemed for a moment that not even Berserker could deflect each of these weapons, not while protecting Saber.

Then a black blade lashed out and batted aside a few dozen within seconds, and Waver was reminded that this Saber Servant was no weakling, no shrinking violet to let another defend her unassisted. Back to back and side to side stood Berserker and Saber, swords flying through the air to defend against the golden king.

A gust of wind so strong it nearly blasted Waver from Rider’s chariot ripped through the area, and cast aside Gilgamesh’s barrage, sending swords and spears from every era, past, present and future, flying every which way. In that moment, Berserker cocked a fist, and Saber was quickly upon that fist; jumping off of that provided point while Berserker punched forward with enough force to cause a concussive blast, Saber sped through the air, and her blade came alight with black, red and violet energy. 

_ Is this  _ **_her_ ** _ Noble Phantasm we’re about to witness? _

“No, boy. This is no Noble Phantasm. It’s something else. A Skill, perhaps?” Rider mused as they watched.

Twisting and spinning in the air in a swirl of fell mana, Saber’s blade crashed into Gilgamesh, or rather, it  _ would  _ have had the King of Heroes’s Noble Phantasm not erupted with weapons, not fired, but merely held, in an attempt to parry. The black sword crashed through his attempts to defend, however, and sent Gilgamesh flying backwards.

Archer--for there was no mistaking the class Gilgamesh was summoned as, not now that his abilities had been revealed--crashed into the ground in a shower of sparks and a clatter of enchanted gold. Recovering quickly, however, he stood once more.

“And now the tables have turned, Gilgamesh, King,” taunted Saber.

“Your insolent rebellion has gone on long enough!” cried Archer, widening his Noble Phantasm to portals beyond counting. Saber’s blade came alight once more with a malignant and maleficent radiance, as she prepared to clash with the golden king again. Then Archer looked away, obviously distressed. “You dare order a king to withdraw?! You’ve got some nerve, Tokio--AGH!”

No sooner was he distracted than did the King of Knights come flying towards him once more, her sword lashing out and tearing through his golden armour with the unpleasant sound of the shearing of metal. Blood flew up into the air as inertia could not catch up to the speed and power of Saber’s blow.

Planting her greaves against his recoiling body, Saber launched herself back to the ground, a safe distance away, her retreat followed by a hail of melee weapons being used as projectiles. Saber levelled her blade at Gilgamesh. “Your sword skills have been greatly diminished of late, King of Heroes. Take that wound, and wear it with pride--and know that thy arrogance is misplaced here. There is more than one king who dwells here. Carve that truth into the very fabric of your soul, and let it follow you, haunt you, even past the end of this Holy Grail War--let it be transcribed upon thy soul that even now rests in the Throne of Heroes!”

Archer went back to his feet, his Noble Phantasm dissipating into so much gold dust, and placed a hand against the mangled gash in his golden armour. His hand came away drenched in blood. “This suit of armour…was forged by the greatest smiths of the Age of Gods… It was able to shrug off the strongest blows of the Bull of Heaven, to resist the petrification of the great serpents of stone… Its magic resistance is second to none… And you  _ dare  _ to rend it with your  _ mongrel hands?! _ ”

“Careful, Archer. You’re growing dangerously close to letting Tokiomi know you can shrug off his Command Seals,” said Saber, and strangely enough, there was an edge of genuine caring in her voice. “And as I know how you like to play the details of your true power close to the chest, I would suggest you make your exit.”

Archer stood to his feet, his hair, once upright like a flame, now falling in bangs across his forehead. It gave off a very different effect. “You may be correct about that, knave. But know that this is not over. I will not rest until I discern the source of your monstrous strength,  _ and neutralise it. _ ”

“Then your enemy is not me, King of Heroes, but Alaya itself,” said Saber. “But I would have it no other way. Until next we meet, Gilgamesh.”

Archer nodded, and dematerialised.

“Mmm… Wasn’t expecting  _ that, _ ” remarked Rider.

“Stand back, Rider!” called Saber. “We’re not out of the woods just yet.”

“Oh! That reminds me! I was going to offer to have you join my army, and…”

“No, Rider,” said Saber. “I’m not exactly the kind of person you would want to be friends with, anyways.

“As for you, Lancelot--though you may think you conceal thy identity beneath a cloak of shadows, I would  _ never  _ mistake my only friend.” Saber’s face, usually so hard and austere, even when grinning, softened into a sweet smile that made her entire countenance relax. No longer was her expression resolute or battle-hardened; no, there was a radiance like that of the sun coming from the gaze with which she favoured Berserker. “I know you wished for my punishment. That you wished for my judgement. I know you sought retribution at my hands. But I must say that I could not, and cannot give that to you--you, who art to me more dear than even Guinevere, who art mine only and truest friend in heaven or earth. For who else could I love but thee?”

Berserker looked around, wildly, and in obvious distress and anguish. It held its helmeted head in between its hands, clad in clawed gauntlets as they were, and spent a few moments thrashing and crying out in what seemed at first to be but simple madness, but was undeniably tinged with…despair?

Then the black knight shimmered and dematerialised in a haze of bluish-black, his anguished cries reaching out toward the heavens and echoing across the firmament.

Saber sighed and slumped. “I would ask of thee, Rider, what your intent was in coming here, but I don’t suppose I’d get a satisfactory answer, would I?”

Rider shrugged. “I suppose that depends on what kind of answer you would deem satisfactory, no?”

Saber chuckled, shaking her head. “I thought not. You are truly immutable, do you know that, King of Conquerors?”

“I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be a compliment, but I’ll take it as one!” said Rider with a broad grin.

“It was meant as one, but all the same, take it as you will. It is no concern of mine,” said Saber, beginning to walk away.

“Would you like a ride back to your Master, Saber?” asked Rider.

“A generous offer, but I think not, Alexander. See to your own Master first. May we cross blades under more auspicious circumstances next time, or indeed, at all.” Saber waved, and then leapt out from the docks, leaving a large crater in the ground where she was but a moment prior.

Iskandar then looked curiously about at Waver, and picked him up by the scruff of his neck, shaking him a bit. “Well, would you look at that? I suppose you  _ do  _ need some looking after, Master. But someone as strong as that, not joining the Hetairoi? What a waste… All the same, perhaps she has a point. 

“After all, if there’s anything I should have learned by now, it is to heed the warnings of women…”

-

Arta leapt across the city, from the highest peak of one building to the highest peak of another.  _ I’m sure you have many questions, Kiritsugu. Be patient. All will become clear in due time. _

Sending that message to her Master, and receiving a clipped and terse affirmation, she sighed. Emiya Kiritsugu was not a bad man by nature. His impossible dream would damn the world to destruction one day, but he was by no means malevolent.

“All the same, should he get in my way, I won’t hesitate to cut him down,” she said aloud, clenching her hand into a fist. “Await me, my love. I come.”

And with that, Arta the Pendragon leapt from her perch and into the deepening shadows of the aging night.

_ -153:48:15 _


End file.
